42 



PRINCIPLES OF PLANT-TERATOLOGY. 



not utilize plants belonging to this group for his re- 

 generation experiments. 



Von Schoenau Las an interesting paper on the 

 branching of mosses. He points out that many mosses 

 have resting, rudimentary, often scarcely-formed, 

 lateral buds. He excised the apex of the stem of 

 several mosses and found that the bud nearest the 

 apex grew out into a branch and gradually pushed 

 over the terminal scar of the excised apex into a 

 lateral, and itself assumed a perfectly terminal 

 position (PI. IV, fig. 1). The same kind of thing, 

 he points out, occurs normally in species of Pohj- 

 tricha del joints, where the main axis terminates in a 

 sporogonium which eventually becomes pushed over 

 into a lateral position by a new lateral shoot. Some- 

 times, as the author figures in Miriam 'undid a turn, 

 two equal strong laterals appear on either side of the 

 scar of the main shoot, giving the appearance of a 

 forked stem ; this becomes still more deceptive when 

 the central scar completely disappears. In other 

 cases, as in Ftilium crista -castrensis, lateral buds from 

 the middle and lower regions of the axis developed 

 into shoots when the main shoot remained intact ; 

 due to the latter' s growth being hindered in some 

 way. Proliferation of lateral branches was also 

 induced in another way : the main shoot of a Milium 

 came, for some reason or other, to lie fiat on the 

 substratum, when three vigorous lateral shoots grew 

 vertically upwards therefrom (PI. IV, fig. 4). He 

 attributes this to the increased moisture and nutrition 

 caused by the main shoot's position. He also caused 

 inhibition of apical growth of shoots of I } ohjtriclium 

 by submerging them in water, when numerous lateral 

 branches grew out from no particular region of the 

 shoot. He also made other experiments in connection 

 with the action of light on branch -form at ion. 



The converse phenomenon was observed by Brizi 

 in the moss B rachi/thecium rutabulum, whose buds 

 occurred in the axils of leaves representing shoots 



